Pioneer Woman at Heart

We had a frost warning for last night, and woke up to a wind chill of 35°F.  It's still April.  We typically can't plant anything until after the last frost, which in our area, is about or after Mother's Day in May (mid May or later).  One year, however, we had a frost in late May, after we planted the entire garden and lost everything that year.  Every year it's different, so we just wait it out. Not only is it cold right now, but the rain is moving back in.  A lot of it.  I'm not looking forward to a flooded chicken run again.   My new laundry basket.  It is the least expensive one we could find ($16.99  Big Lots) to at least make my life easier during then next 2-3 weeks (or longer).  My husband had to drive about 22 miles to get it, but I have never been this excited about a laundry basket.  I know this one won't last very long, as it's all completely plastic, including the wheels, but like I said, laundry will keep getting done...

Here is yet another draft resurrected, and this one was drafted up way back in September of 2018.  There are probably so many more remedies, but posting this. ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~ S ummer time means some folks may get poison ivy while doing yard work, foraging, camping, or just gardening.  One year, we had wild growing milkweed, and we simply cut pieces each day, and applied the milk from the weed to the poison ivy.  It will burn a bit, but we left it on for about 20 minutes then removed it with cool water.  It dried up the poison ivy fairly quickly. You can soak in a bathtub with warm water and plantain tea bags (1-2 tsp of dried plantain per teabag).  I have large muslin bags I use for bath teas. A dandelion poultice can be applied to poison ivy to help dry it up, and reduce the itch. Cleaver poultices.  They cool the inflamed skin, and aid healing.   Chickweed salve is also good for healing poison ivy.  ...

  (wild violets) The flower beds are full of spring blooms, but boy are they full of chickweed and other weeds.  I took these photos over two weeks ago, and forgot about them.  Other than tulip photos.  We did not mulch them last year for some reason, and we will be this year.  It will be hit or miss, as the rain comes and goes, and everything continues to remain wet around here.  I do have plans to add some new spring colors for next year.  The only reason I have very little tulips, is due to moles.  The new windmill is going up soon, and hopefully we can fall plant some more tulips next fall. Many, years ago, I was out weeding the flower beds, and a van pulled into the drive.  The older gentleman opened his window, and said not to mind them, as his wife loves to drive thru and see the flowers in the flower beds. He said it made her happy.  It was a couple that lives down the road from us.  That was a feel good moment.   ...

It appears that some of the bigger projects on our to-do list will be taking a longer break than we want.  Atleast anything related to climbing a ladder around here. Oh boy.  I did it again.  I'm mostly mad at myself, because I just started to clean up flower beds, and was about to start raking out weeds from the already tilled vegetable garden (s). It's an eye roller moment. I've been MIA a bit in blogger-land this past week.  First, I was instructed to stay off my feet, other than to use the bathroom.  Second, I was instructed to use crutches when I was up.  They were (yes were) the most pain in the rump to use.  I can say, that I can stand to lose more weight than I thought ha ha!  Lifting myself on those was a complete work out in itself. The urgent care I went to did not have any boots.  I thought this was very odd for an urgent care facility.  They gave me paperwork to take to a medical supply in the same town.  Again, no boot...

Do you freeze your home grown blueberries, or freeze locally picked ones?  We are unable to grow the plants, due to the limestone here, so I hunt down produce stands that sell blueberries grown in the area or in MI. I've been looking for more creative ways to add nutrition, protein (not protein powders), fiber and whatnot into our breakfast. I look for more ways to utilize what we have in the freezer, like blueberries.  My husband was intrigued at this idea for the blueberries.  It looks like blueberry jam, but it is not. I used a slice of sourdough (or use what you like), topped with the freshly ground peanut butter (peanuts only) we purchased, organic hemp hearts sprinkled (to get 1 full Tbsp. I need to sprinkle some on the peanut butter and then on top of everything), and finally topped with frozen blueberries heated with organic cinnamon mixed into it . I used about 1/3 cup of blueberries.  Yum!  Healthy.  Fills us up. I just heated the blueberries, sma...

Do you plant radishes in your garden?    We absolutely love diced hashbrowns made with home grown french breakfast radishes.  We didn't get to grow them last year, and we will be this spring.  We didn't get to grow any variety of radishes last year for that matter. Hankering some radish hashbrowns, I bought a pound of regular radishes and made a different version of radish hasbrowns.  My husband made me promise not to serve him green beans for breakfast, but he got radishes ha ha!   I can see why the original recipe calls for 2# of radishes.  They do not amount to much after you squeeze the water out, prior to cooking them first.  I had 1# on hand, so that is what I used.  I highly recommend using 2#, as you add only one egg, and one egg to 1# vs. 2# was too much, and made the cooking time longer. You shred/grate (a food processor speeds up the process) the radishes, squeeze the water out, cook them, cool them, add an egg, and cook them...

  The ladies are back to normal egg production, so I washed some up for scrambled eggs to go with breakfast.  I also tried a new recipe, and I'll try to get that posted tomorrow.  Any radish lovers out there?  Shockingly, the new recipe was delicious. I decided to make another pumpkin oat breakfast bake (vs. pancakes) this time around, and I have to say, I'm very happy with the pumpkins we grew last year.  I planted a different variety, and the puree is much thicker than the previous pie pumpkins we've planted. What did I plant?  Winter Luxury Pie Pumpkin, Baker Creek Seeds. Do you have a favorite pie pumpkin that you plant in your garden? The crock pot pork chops I recently made us, used up the very last container of homemade cream of mushroom soup we had in the freezer.  I don't use it that often, but it comes in handy, and it's much healthier. The spring rains are thankfully bringing the herb garden back to life, and just in time.  I am gettin...